Burn With Me (22 page)

She was rambling, her punches weak but still hitting their mark. “You saw what I could do. You knew I wasn’t— Why
didn’t
you tell me earlier?”

He gripped her elbows, lifting her off her feet and walking deeper into the stables. His expression was grim. “At first I thought you knew. When I caught your scent, I just assumed. Jinn sense us. It’s a protective adaptation. When I realized you didn’t, I—well, I wasn’t thinking about anything but myself. Why I was so drawn to someone who carried the blood of my enemy. Who seemed to be in league with them.”

She scoffed and he lowered her to the ground, shaking her lightly. “I was going to tell you. It never occurred to me that you would find out like this. That Hill was involved in any way with your family.”

Aziza crossed her arms over her chest protectively. “Then prove you aren’t like the rest of them.” She glared at Ram, who’d wandered closer, listening with an enigmatic expression. “Prove it and tell me now.”

Brandon glanced behind him and reached for a stool pressed against the wall, dragging it to the middle of the stable floor and sitting resolutely. “That’s why I’m here.”

She was shocked into momentary silence. “Really? No riddles or half truths? You’ll tell me whatever I want to know?”

He looked directly into her eyes, his own full of regret and determination. “You deserve to know.”

Ram sneered and leaned against the stall nearest Brandon. “What a kiss-up. Please send him away, Aziza. I don’t have the stomach for his Boy Scout act.”

Aziza ignored him. “Let’s start with an easy one. Werewolf. What’s that about? Were you bitten? Genetically enhanced by a mad Niyr scientist to go wolfy on the full moon?”

Brandon lifted an eyebrow in disbelief, but he didn’t hesitate to answer. “I was born, as we all were. Werewolves are fewer in number than humans, but we aren’t an anomaly. We’ve always been here. With you. Evolving and changing as humanity evolved and changed. And despite stories to the contrary, the moon has nothing to do with our transformation. We control it as naturally as you breathe.”

“Man’s best friend,” Ram snickered. “Isn’t it sweet?”

Aziza shook her head, inwardly proud of herself for handling everything so well. Thank God for the miracle of wine. “That’s not possible. Why haven’t any bones been found? Any evidence? There’s more proof that Sasquatch exists than werewolves.”

Brandon looked down at the hands he’d placed on his muscular thighs. “Our bones don’t appear any different from yours, but our blood is. Our DNA. My people have always been aware of the need for secrecy. Humans are easily frightened, and they become dangerous in their fear. Like many other cultures, we burn our fallen until nothing remains but ash. We return to the earth, as it was meant to be. The side effect of that is that there is nothing to find. Nothing to reveal our true nature.”

“You said you’re fewer in number than us…than humans,” she corrected herself with a hard swallow. It was hard to focus through the blur of spirits in her system, but when would she get another chance like this? He was willing to tell her anything. “Why?”

He hesitated for a moment. “As a species we live substantially longer than humans, and our unions cannot be dissolved. Because of that, greater care is taken in picking a life mate from one of the families. Some of us wait for decades, and since conception is only possible between our kind once the bond is forged…”

“That is more than I ever wanted to know about how baby Enforcers are made,” Ram grimaced. “Can’t you ask him more interesting questions before my stomach turns? I know, let’s see if he’ll tell you about all the devices his kind have created to torture my people during interrogations.”

She lifted a threatening fist to subtly shut Ram up and sent Brandon a confused look. “You mean it’s not physically possible unless you’re…bonded? As in married? Then why did you pull—” She stopped herself from finishing that sentence, aware of Ram’s renewed interest.

Brandon’s jaw clenched. “
Our kind
, Aziza,” he emphasized. “Human physiology is not the same, which is why we are more careful in our relationships with those outside of our species. And you—there’s never been, to my knowledge, an opportunity to discover what would happen between a wolf and a Jinn or Shiner. We don’t mix.”

“Oh, now I think I’m safe in saying that he’s lying.” Ram crossed his arms. “In the history of your world, when has prejudice or hatred ever worked as a foolproof sexual deterrent? He knows exactly what happens. You’re not really listening to him are you?”

She ignored Ram and her cheeks heated. So, he had been protecting her. “Why do you call the Niyr Shiners?”

“The glow.” He made it sound like a curse. “The energy they only began to hide when humanity became civilized enough to question their appearance as anything other than angels or magical messengers. My kind can still see it. It disturbs the air around them. They can’t hide it from us.”

She thought about the light that had come from Te’s hands. His platinum hair that shimmered a bit too brightly. “It sounds like you don’t like the Niyr either. Why? They can’t
all
be criminals. Why do you hate them so much?”

“Hate
us
, Aziza,” Ram whispered. “Remember what you are.”

Brandon placed a hand on the back of his neck and rubbed. “I’m no historian, Aziza. I just know it’s always been this way. We’ve always fought against their push into our world. What they do is unnatural. Use humans. Control humans. Invade our space like it’s a vacation spot created for their personal pleasure. Upset the balance.” He lifted his other hand and clenched it like a fist. “We can feel it. See it.”

“Not everything, obviously,” Ram murmured.

“We’ve always sought to stop it, but after the war, stronger steps were taken. My people have been policing theirs for thousands of years and protecting the land from their influence. It’s who we are.”

She glanced at Ram, waiting for another snide comment. He was silent. She turned back to Brandon. “So your kind were a part of the treaty I’ve heard mentioned repeatedly?”

“In a way,” he hedged, avoiding her gaze. “We were given authority to guard the borders and enforce restrictions on all of them. With that authority, we have spread across the globe, aligned ourselves with kingdoms and governments to ensure efficiency and success. My great-grandfather, as the Alpha of my family at the time, was responsible for our allegiance with Richard the Lionheart. We were given lands in payment for our service to the crown.”

His great-grandfather? Just one great? But that would be impossible. On the other hand, what the hell did she know? He said they lived longer than humans. Maybe werewolves were immortal. Or just really damn old.

And now she wanted to ask him how old he was. “Not that this isn’t riveting, but what aren’t you telling me, Brandon? You promised, remember? You said I deserved to know, then I said
treaty
and you started rambling.”

He stood and reached for her, but she stepped back, making him pause. “I knew the word
Fireborne
. Didn’t know why. I was so obsessed with you, so determined to be near you, watch you, that I didn’t report your presence. If I had, maybe I would have been able to find out sooner.”

She was almost afraid to ask. “Find out what?”

“What Hillary kept secret for years to protect her lover’s family. What she kept from the leader of our people, from my father. What you are to my kind. What you mean.” He stepped closer as if he couldn’t help himself. “Aziza, you’re important. More than I knew. It’s been so long, most of us have forgotten why we chose this path. Have forgotten everything but hate for the invaders, beaten into us from birth. But the archivist knows. Hill knows.”

And now, she could tell, he knew. “What am I to you, Brandon?”

His expression softened. “To me? What are you to me?” He reached out to cup her cheek and she pressed into it instinctively, closing her eyes. “Aziza, I know you’re still angry at me, but are you truly asking?”

“Yes.
No.
I mean, to your people. What does Hill know about me that she felt needed to be kept secret?”
And yes, what do I mean to you? Do you feel as strongly about me? Does being this close still affect you the way it affects me?

Brandon’s expression showed a flicker of disappointment. “My people would call you the Vessel of Fire. Before today they were just words we used in ritual, never really knowing what it meant. Never knowing where those words came from. Even our nursery rhymes speak of you, but still I never put two and two together.”

“I’m in a children’s rhyme?”

“You are.” He nodded, lowering his voice as he recited it from memory. “Jinn are born from smokeless fire, Niyr the light from flame. Man of clay was heated there, and wolves were made the same. Though smoke may burn your lungs to ash and light can blind your way, a vessel that holds all the fire will win the wolves the day.”

“Hold on a second.” She reached up to rub her temples. “I think I stashed another bottle around here somewhere.” She turned and walked to the far corner of the stables, kicking several empty bottles out of her way before she saw it. “Score.”

She opened the bottle in deafening silence. She knew they were watching her. Both of them. Jinn and werewolf. Both of them drawing her in, giving her the kind of pleasure she’d only fantasized about. Both of them driving her crazy. Expecting her to be—what? A warrior? A savior? The mighty arm of justice?

Who was she supposed to be saving? Not her family. Not her brothers. Why was she supposed to care?

She snorted and lifted the bottle to her lips, tilting her head back to drink the tart wine as if it were water. As if she were in the desert, dying of thirst.

“Aziza, stop,” Brandon pleaded roughly. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

She lowered the bottle with a chuckle. “I don’t think, Copper. Remember? It’s my motto. My brand.” She thought about her dream and shook her head. “Joseph said I had to accept it all, but how can I? It’s too much. This wasn’t supposed to be
me
. I wasn’t supposed to be Fireborne. Those damned keepers of the damned sand made a mistake. I wasn’t supposed to be anybody’s vessel. You may as well leave now, Brandon. Go back and tell them you were at your most persuasive. Dead sexy, with just the right dash of kink. But no matter how much I want you, it isn’t enough to make me something I’m not.”

She pointed at the silent Ram, her finger weaving unsteadily. “None of you can make me something I’m not. I don’t want it. Go fight amongst yourselves and blow up the world…because I don’t care. I didn’t ask for any of this.”

Brandon tore the bottle from her hand and held it away from her, his other hand gripping her arm as she struggled. “You think
I
wanted this? That I was looking for a way to come under suspicion by my own kind for my actions? That I watched you, hid you from them, stood with you in the same room with my enemies for so long I can’t
not
smell them, because I had any kind of choice?”

“You have a choice.” She frowned as she reached for the bottle and missed. “Go back to playing border patrol and forget this idea that I’m going to win you any day. Forget me.”

“You’d rather I left you with them?” he snarled dangerously. “Do you think they can protect you? That they deserve to protect you? You don’t belong to them.”

“I don’t belong to anyone.”

He lowered the bottle to her neck and tipped it against her skin. “Do you think they can satisfy your desires?” She gasped when the red liquid spilled down her collarbone and underneath her cotton top. He growled. “They are made of mist. They don’t belong here. They aren’t real. But
I
am. Flesh and bone. I can make you feel how real I am.”

He dropped the bottle carelessly to the ground and reached for her shirt, rending it in half with an ease that left her breathless. “Aziza,” he murmured roughly. He curved his body and lowered his head between her breasts, lapping at the liquid-coated flesh.

“Brandon, wait.” She shook her head, even as she lifted her hands to his hair, holding him closer. His tongue. The scratch of his beard against her skin. She wanted it again. All of it. More of it. She didn’t care what he was.

She wanted him to be hers.

“You give your gifts too easily,” Ram muttered. “He can’t appreciate them, he just wants to use them.”

“No.” It couldn’t happen. Not just because she could hurt him. Not just because he was a werewolf with manners and a body that turned her into a mindless drooling schoolgirl.

What if
they
were watching again? The way Ram was watching them. “We can’t, Brandon. They might see.”

He lifted his head, his eyes narrowing. Alert. “Who?”

“Shh, Aziza, you mustn’t tell,” Ram whispered in her ear, his body pressing against her back, allowing her to feel his erection. “He doesn’t need to know everything about us, does he? Doesn’t need to know that you were being watched in the dining room. Doesn’t have to know what I’m going to do to you as he fucks you. In fact, if it truly concerns you, I believe I saw something you didn’t in your friend’s writings. A Fireborne carries the same sand inside them that the keeper holds. The sand conceals, Aziza. You can conceal us from all others. Make your very own iron room.”

He gripped her hips, bent his legs and thrust his cock against her ass, making her moan. “How?”

Ram hummed with pleasure. “I knew you’d like that. The same way you stop time. The same way you burn. You have to want it. Create it in your mind.”

“How what, Aziza?” Brandon, who couldn’t hear Ram or see him, held her chin between his fingers and forced her to meet his gaze. “How what? Do you need me to stop? Are you still unwilling to forgive me?”

She studied his strong, beautiful face with a bemused smile. “How can I resist you?”

Brandon’s eyes closed in lust and relief as he kissed her lips.

“You can’t. I can see that now,” Ram answered instead. “You won’t be satisfied until he proves me right and shatters your trust. And being the evil Jinn you think I am, I will take my advantage where I can. You may be stubborn, Fireborne, but you cannot resist us both. And you’ll have us both…because you’ll never tell him I’m here.”